TALES FROM THE BOBBI LAMA

I just came across an engaging poem that I have seen several times before. It’s about death. Everytime I read this poem, I take it in a little differently depending on my evolving beliefs of the afterlife. The name of the poem is “Immortality” by Claire Harner, written in 1934. (I’ve also seen another very similar version said to be by Mary Elizabeth Frye.) It speaks to the understanding that we go on…we don’t just end when our body does. I believe that now, especially with all of the promised signs sent to me from my late husband. I couldn’t understand the poem years ago when my grandfather passed on. The description it portrays, of one who is deceased, seemed too abstract for me. I wanted my Pop Pop to continue on being who he was, and couldn’t wrap my head around him “being in a thousand winds that blow.” Even as a little girl in catechism class, we were told “God is everywhere…all knowing…all powerful…and all loving.” That was a little too much to grasp at age seven, you know? But now, with the greater understanding of our eternal consciousness, our soul energy, and the Oneness of which we are all a part…I’m understanding it better now.

Immortality

Do not stand
By my grave, and weep.
I am not there,
I do not sleep—
I am the thousand winds that blow
I am the diamond glints in snow
I am the sunlight on ripened grain,
I am the gentle, autumn rain.
As you awake with morning’s hush,
I am the swift, up-flinging rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight,
I am the day transcending night.
Do not stand
By my grave, and cry—
I am not there,
I did not die.

One of the greatest gifts of my lifetime, is the peace I feel from embracing this as true.